Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Hydraulic Engineering Section

Course of «Fluid Labs»

REFERENCE SOLUTION FOR THE THIRD BENCHMARK

CASE (TURBULENT FLOW AROUND A CYLINDER)

Prof. Stefano Malavasi, Dr. Gianandrea Messa

Results obtained by student Luca Fenini (AA. 2013-2014)

 Steady-state flow: inflow

The inflow boundary must be placed sufficiently far

upstream the cylinder, so that the flow can slow down
up to the stagnation point.

Axial velocitydi
Andamento profile upstream
velocità prima the
del cylinder
cilindro
0.4

0.35

0.3

0.25 Stagnation
point
u [m/s]

0.2

0.15

0.1

0.05
Lu>6D
0

−0.05
−18 −16 −14 −12 −10 −8 −6 −4 −2 0 2
x/Dp
Steady-state flow: width

The size of the domain in the crosswise direction

must be sufficiently large for the pressure to reach a
stable value at the horizontal boundaries.

Crosswise sulla
Pressione pressure profilepassante
sezione through the
percenter of the
il centro delcylinder
cilindro
5

1
y/Dp

−1

−2

−3

−4

−5
−180 −160 −140 −120 −100 −80 −60 −40 −20 0 20
[Pa]
Steady-state flow: outflow

The outflow boundary must be place sufficiently far

downstream the cylinder for the condition dϕ/dx ≈ 0
to be consistently applied.
Axial velocity downstream the cylinder
Andamento di velocità dopo il cilindro
0.4

0.35

0.3

0.25
u [m/s]

0.2

0.15

0.1

0.05

Lu>30D
0

−0.05
−5 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
x/Dp
 Computational domain

Lu=6D Ld=26D
H=4.5D

SYMMETRY

L=2 m

In the steady-state case the symmetry of the mean flow

can be exploited by solving only half of the cylinder,
thereby halving the CPU time.
 Computational mesh

In the steady-state case the symmetry of the mean flow

can be exploited by solving only half of the cylinder,
thereby halving the CPU time.
NULL OBJECT

INNER REGION

A null object surrounds the cylinder, so that the grid

can be made finer close to the object where
turbulence is most effective.
This was done by keeping a Vertical cells
= 1/4
costant cells ratio in this region. Horizontal cells
Grid-independence study

First attempt: 40 by 10 cells in the

region indentified by the “null” object.
Target parameter: average forces
Results:

FD=0.6 N
Other than 0:
Physically inconsistent!
FL=0.21 N
Grid-independence study

Second attempt: 80 by 20 cells in the

region indentified by the “null” object.
Results:

FD = 0.52 N
FL ≈ 0 N Numerically consistent?

The average lift is no longer physically

inconsistent, but tests with other
meshes are needed to guarantee the
numerical consistency of the results.
 Grid-independence study

Going on doubling the cells in the

“inner region” the following trend is
obtained.
Andamento$delle$Forze$di$Drag$medie$
Average Drag Force versus NX in the «inner region»
0.700#

0.600#

0.500#

0.400#
[N]$
0.300#

0.200#

0.100#

0.000#
0# 100# 200# 300# 400# 500# 600# 700#
numero$di$celle$in$orizzontale$
NX in the «inner region»
 Effect of number of iterations

For each grid, it was verified that the number of iteration is

sufficient to achieve converged values of CD, CL.
The following plots refer to the mesh used for comparison
with the experiments.

Enough
 Comparison against PFT solution
VelocityVelocità
modulus primaupstream
del cilindro the cylinder Velocity
Velocity modulusdownstream
modulus downstream the
the cylinder
cylinder
0.4 0.4

0.35
0.35

0.3
0.3
0.25

0.25
0.2
[m/s]

[m/s]
0.2 0.15

0.1
0.15

0.05

0.1
0

0.05
−0.05
Profilo CFD Profilo CFD
Profilo soluzione a potenziale Profilo soluzione a potenziale
0 −0.1
−25 −20 −15 −10 −5 0 0 10 20 30 40 50 60

x/r x/r

Velocity modulus in theil cilindro

Velocità sopra crosswise direction
9
Profilo CFD
Profilo soluzione a potenziale
8

6
y/r

1
0.4 0.45 0.5 0.55 0.6 0.65 0.7 0.75 0.8
[m/s]
 Comparison against experiments

The computed average drag coefficient was compared

against the value reported in the literature for the
same Re=24000, which is around 1.17.

The computed value is 0.57, around half of it.

Since it was proved that the estimated Cd does not

depend upon mesh and number of iterations, the
difference may be due to:
•  Errors in the treatment of Partially-Blocked cells
•  Inadequacy of the turbulence model
•  …
 Unsteady flow domain

No symmetry can be exploited in the flow. The whole

cylinder has to be simulated then.
 Space and time discretization

Andamento$delle$Forze$di$Drag$medie$
The spatial mesh Average Drag Force versus NX in the «inner region»

consists of 320x160
0.700#

0.600#

cells in the “inner- 0.500#

region”, and correspond

0.400#
[N]$
0.300#

to the circled point in 0.200#

the plot derived for the

0.100#

0.000#

single-phase case.
0# 100# 200# 300# 400# 500# 600# 700#
numero$di$celle$in$orizzontale$

The time step is sufficiently lower than the

characteristic period of vortex shedding, estimated
from the literature correlation of Fey et al. (1998):

TFey=0.75 s → ΔT=0.005 s
Calculation of the Strouhal number

Andamento%temporale%della%forza%di%li5%
Time history of the lift force
0,06%

0,04%

0,02%

[Pa]% 0,00%

!0,02%

!0,04%

!0,06%
0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30%
secondi%

•  Oscillations start at 9 s.
•  Periodic behaviour is observed after 15 s.
•  By means of the FT, it is possible to obtain the
frequency of vortex shedding, and the
corresponding Strouhal number which is ≅0.195
Calculation of the Strouhal number

•  A systematic study should be performed for

guaranteeing that the chosen time step is capable
of providing consistent estimates of the Strouhal
number.
•  Nevertheless, this was not done due to
computational/time limits (N.B. for the used
settings: CPU time ≈ 15h , disk space ≈ 5 GB).
•  This should be taken into account when comparing
the computed Strouhal number (≈ 0.195) with the
value obtained from the correlation of Fey et al.,
which is 0.198.